Clark opened the cabinet, pulling out the plates, and closed it again before walking to the table. He could feel his mother’s eyes on him as he set the table, and he knew she was both happy to have him home and curious about his trip.
They sat down, passing around the roast chicken and vegetables, and settling in.
“So,” Martha said. “Tell us about your trip.”
He smiled and hit some of the highlights, both the touristy adventures like the music festival and Jakarta fair, and his private adventures like swimming along the coral reef and floating in the tree canopy.
He laughed suddenly, remembering the baby orangutans. He described the scene, and his sympathy for Martha as he remembered his own childhood antics.
“I remember those days,” Martha said with a laugh. “Ginny and I could never finish a conversation without being interrupted. And then on the rare occasion we did, we’d look at each other in horror, wondering what the two of you had gotten up to.”
“Come on,” Clark said with a laugh. “Lana and I weren’t that bad. We didn’t get up to half the trouble the boys did.”
When both the Lang and Kent households had found themselves celebrating the arrival of surprise babies within a few months of each other, the children had automatically been sorted by their parents into two groups: “the babies” and “the boys” – Ginny Lang’s older three sons, aged 13, 11, and 10 at the time. Lana had been a late-in-life bonus baby whose pregnancy hadn’t been discovered until nearly halfway through, and of course, Clark had dropped into his parents’ lives unexpectedly and without warning.
No one had expected the group classifications to stick so thoroughly, especially “the babies” themselves who protested the nickname vehemently for years. But thirty years later, they were still “the boys” and “the babies”, and Clark wondered at times if he and Lana would be grandparents themselves before the nickname finally shook free.
“Well, that’s certainly true,” Martha said. “Poor Ginny had her hands full.”
“I ran into Teddy down at the tractor supply store yesterday,” Jonathan said. Teddy, the youngest of the boys, had worked alongside his father for years, and had taken over the Lang farm when his father retired last year. He and his wife had built a home on the Lang property and were now officially the Kent’s closest neighbors.
Martha looked up, suddenly interested. “Did you ask about Susan? She’s due any day.”
Jonathan looked at her like she had lost her mind. “No. I asked him what tractor parts he was looking for and told him to stop by and see what I’ve got on hand before he bought anything.”
“I’ll give Susan a call this week,” Martha said, rolling her eyes. She turned her attention to Clark. “It sounds like a great trip, but you didn’t mention the weekend in Metropolis. How was that?”
“It was good,” Clark said, smiling immediately at the thought of her. “Really good.”
“What did you do there?” Jonathan asked, and Clark looked over to him, a little surprised by his question after all his warnings the last time they had spoken.
“We did a bunch of touristy stuff – a couple of city tours, the natural history museum, dinner at this great restaurant with lots of sports memorabilia,” Clark answered, intentionally omitting any mention of his rescue and their undercover assignment, and detailing more of the touristy stuff they had done when his father nodded at him to continue.
“And how was Lois?” Martha asked when he finished. “Did you…have a nice time with her?”
Clark’s eyes flicked over to his father’s face, and then back to his mom. They had always had such a close relationship. He told them almost everything. And he was dying to talk about her. But he couldn’t bear to hear his father’s lectures and admonitions today. Not with the memory of that kiss so fresh in his mind. Not when he was so unbearably happy.
“It was…wonderful,” he said carefully. “We had a great time. It was…”
He trailed off, unsure what else to say.
“When you left, you said you didn’t know what it meant that she invited you,” Martha said, leading him hopefully. “Do you know now?”
His eyes flicked to his father again. He seemed to be waiting for his answer too, without his mother’s unbridled eagerness, but also without censure.
“Things between us…. It was special. She’s special. I don’t know how to explain….” He put his fork down, wanting to say more, but struggling to find the words.
“Son,” his father said softly, and Clark turned to look at him, waiting for his reproof.
Jonathan shook his head. “I’m sorry, Clark. I… I don’t want you to feel like you can’t talk to us because you’re afraid of my disapproval. I know I can be overprotective. I know I push you too hard sometimes. You’re a grown man. You’ve never been anything but responsible and thoughtful. We trust you to be safe. And we want you to be happy. If she makes you happy, we want to hear about her.”
Clark nodded, unable to speak immediately through the lump in his throat. “Thanks, Dad. It’s not… It’s not just that I’m trying to avoid your disapproval. I just don’t know how to talk about this. It’s…”
His mother took pity on him, and smiled, reaching over to pat his arm. “It must have been a little…awkward? You barely know her. You just met her at the conference, and since then you’ve just been emailing a bit?”
Clark hesitated, smiling guiltily. “It’s…been a bit more than that. We email every day. Sometimes back and forth for hours. And we talk on the phone every Sunday night for three or four hours.”
“Four hours?” his father said, obviously both surprised and a little horrified at the prospect of spending such a long stretch on the phone.
His mother, on the other hand, looked delighted. “Is that why you’ve been rushing out of here every week? I couldn’t figure it out. I thought something was wrong with my pies!”
Clark laughed. “There’s nothing wrong with your pies, mom. Sundays are just the best time for us to talk. Her schedule can be a little unpredictable, so it’s nice to have a set night.”
“Are you going to call her when you leave here tonight?” she asked hopefully.
He nodded and smiled sheepishly. “Though I talked to her yesterday too…. And Friday. So…. I’m not sure our Sunday phone call is quite the big deal it used to be.”
“You called her Friday when you got home?” Martha asked, clearly surprised.
He paused, wondering if he should tell them, and decided just to bite the bullet. “I went to see her on Friday first.”
Jonathan sat up straighter in his chair, and Clark could see him biting back a question. He held up a hand to reassure him. “I checked the flights. I told her my connecting flight was full, and I got bumped to the next flight. That it gave me a couple hours for a layover I wasn’t expecting.”
His father raised his eyebrows and nodded, satisfied with Clark’s caution.
“Tell us more,” Martha said, practically levitating out of her seat. “Did you call her from the airport? Was she shocked? She hadn’t heard from you all month and then you just called her out of the blue?”
Clark grinned sheepishly again. “I…wrote her letters all summer.”
His mother pressed a hand to her heart, the giddy excitement on her face morphing into something more serious. He worried for a second she might cry.
“Letters?” she said.
“Every day,” he confirmed quietly. “And postcards too. There was a delay, because of the mail, but I knew when I left that she had to have received a week or two’s worth. And the first letter…” He trailed off, some things too private to share with his parents. But he could see by their faces that they understood these were not just breezy, chatty letters from one friend to another.
“I made up the story about the overbooked flight, and then I showed up at her work. I probably should have called, but it never occurred to me. I had to be there in person. I had to see her face. I had to know if she felt the same way I did. I do. I…”
“And she does?” Martha asked, with a watery smile.
He nodded, his heart tight in his chest. “Yeah, she does.”
“Well, that’s just…” Martha was so overcome she couldn’t even find the words.
“We’re happy for you, son,” Jonathan said softly. “Truly. Why don’t you tell us a little about her?”
Clark looked at the ceiling and shook his head, no idea where to even begin. “She is…the most brilliant woman I’ve ever met,” he said finally, looking back and forth between them. “She is determined and driven and an unstoppable force for good. She cares so much about everything, and she won’t let anyone get in her way of making this world a better place. She…makes me want to be…better…be…more.”
He saw his parents exchange a knowing look that he wasn’t completely sure he understood, and dismissed it, preferring to think about her instead.
“She’s…funny. So funny. She makes me laugh all the time. Except she’s also so serious. And we can talk about…anything. Everything. She understands me. She sees me. I don’t even have to tell her what I’m thinking sometimes, and she just knows,” he said, thinking back to Friday, when he had surprised her at work, and she had known Perry’s comment about his career would make him feel melancholy.
“I love talking to her. We can talk for hours and hours, and it’s never enough. It’s always so hard to say goodbye. And when I was there the first time, on our last night, we ditched this fancy art gallery thing that turned out to be….not great. And we went back to her house, and we watched movies and just… didn’t talk. We were just…together. And that was amazing too. I’m so comfortable with her. I just want to be with her all the time.”
“And she's gorgeous,” he said, with a little laugh. “She’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. I… I cannot believe she’s interested in me. I cannot believe she feels even a fraction of what I’m feeling. She’s…amazing. She’s… When I left, after our first visit, I was completely consumed by thoughts of her. I couldn’t think of anything else. I was sick with missing her. And I wrote her these letters, and I had no idea what she was thinking when she received them. And I had to see her. So I went. And I stepped out of the elevator, and she saw me, and there was this moment where she was still processing that I was really there. And I was waiting for her reaction. And it was the longest moment of my life; I’ve never been that nervous, that scared. Never, not even when we found that rock at Wayne’s place that made me so sick. Never. And then…she just ran…right into my arms, and I twirled her around like something out of a movie. It was the best day of my life.”
He stopped, realizing suddenly how much he had said, how long he had been talking. His parents both looked a little shellshocked. Tears glistened in his mother’s eyes.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I got…carried away.”
“Oh, Clark,” she said, shaking her head. “You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear you like this. How much I wanted this for you.”
“It’s still complicated,” he said. “She lives all the way in Metropolis. Her life is there. My life is here. And there are things she doesn’t know about me. Things…she might never know.”
“You don’t have to solve all that right now,” his mother said, glancing over at his father.
“You’ll figure it out, son,” he said. “If it’s meant to be, you’ll figure out all the details.”
They finished their dinner in relative silence, commenting only on the food. And soon Clark was clearing the table, preparing to wash the dishes, while his mother sliced into a peach pie. A moment later, she shooed him away from the sink, handing him a Tupperware container full of pie.
“Go,” she said with a smile. “Go call your girl.”
He hesitated, then hugged her tightly. “Thanks, Mom.”
He poked his head into the living room, where his Dad was sitting on the couch. “I’m heading out, Dad.”
“No pie?” he said, teasing.
Clark held up the Tupperware, and Jonathan laughed.
“She really was worried something was wrong with her pies,” he said, eyes twinkling. He stood and nodded toward the door. “I’ll walk you out.”
They walked in silence to Clark’s truck, hesitating when they reached the door.
“I’m really happy for you,” Jonathan said finally. “You’ll figure it out. The details. You always do.”
“Thanks, Dad,” Clark said.
Jonathan opened his arms, and Clark stepped into his embrace, slapping his dad on the back.
“We’ve missed you,” his dad said, and Clark knew he didn’t just mean while Clark traveled.
“I missed you too,” Clark said. “I’ve only got morning practices this week. I’ll come by one day, and we can catch up on some chores.”
Jonathan nodded and slapped him on the arm, then stepped back and waited until Clark got into his truck and headed home.
*****
The final weeks of summer sped by in a blur of football practices, dinners with his parents, and phone calls to Lois. Soon he was back in the classroom too, preparing for the return of his students – setting up his classroom, finalizing his syllabi, and prepping his lesson plans.
Once school started again, he was there from dawn to dusk, coming in before school for newspaper staff meetings and staying late for football practice. His days of long leisurely phone calls to Lois were a thing of the past, and though he tried valiantly to call her two or three times a week, even if the calls themselves would have to be brief, they just couldn’t seem to make their schedules mesh and had started reverting to occasional emails.
Lois seemed to understand, and he assumed she was having no trouble filling that extra time with her own work. Her investigation into the Toasters was finally making some progress, thanks to some of the jailhouse interviews he had suggested.
Apparently, Toni hadn’t been the mastermind behind the Toasters’ weapons, only the supplier. And when Toasters had gone to ground, a shadowy figure they knew only as The Boss, had come to collect their weapons. The Boss had not had time to collect all of them before the police moved in, but he – whoever he was – definitely had two, and likely the ability to engineer more.
Last night had been the first football game of the season, and Clark hadn’t made it home until nearly midnight after celebrating with the team and studying the tapes a bit. He had crashed immediately when he got home, shutting off his alarm clock before falling asleep, and looking forward to a three-day weekend thanks to Labor Day. Now he was waking up leisurely, enjoying his first true day off in weeks.
He stretched and rolled over to look at the alarm clock beside his bed. 8:45. So 9:45 in Metropolis he calculated automatically. He laughed at himself. Clearly he had a one-track mind. Even his subconscious was always thinking of her.
It was possible she was home. Some Saturday mornings she went to the open gym at her dojo to spar, but it was drop-in, so she only went when she felt like it.
He reached for the phone and dialed her number, then leaned back against his pillows, propped against the headboard of his bed. The phone rang three times, and he was just about to give up and assume she was at the dojo, when he heard the line connect and then her voice.
“Hello,” she said, already annoyed. He wondered if she was expecting a telemarketer or a wrong number.
“Hey,” he said softly.
“Hi!” she said, all traces of annoyance gone. She sounded so sweet and so happy to hear from him that his heart clenched in his chest.
“What are you doing?” he asked. “Did I catch you at a bad time? You sounded annoyed at the phone.”
“No,” she said quickly. “It’s fine. It’s nothing. Tell me about the game.”
“56 to 17. It was a rout. I almost felt bad for them.”
“No mercy, Kent. Mercy’s not gonna get you to State,” she teased.
He closed his eyes and smiled. God, he adored her.
“Tell me more,” she said softly. “Tell me the whole thing.”
He started from the beginning, going through the whole game, hitting all the highlights and major missteps, while she listened quietly, interjecting occasionally to ask a question or offer an opinion.
When he was finished, she asked about his classes, and he filled her in quickly, eager for her to talk for a while so he could catch up on things in her life and hear her voice.
“How are things there?” he said. “I hardly talked to you at all this week. How’s your investigation going?”
“Eh,” she said. “Nothing new. It’s on the back burner again while I wait to hear back from some sources, see if I can get a lead on this Boss guy.”
“Anything else interesting?”
“Not really,” she said. “How’s the newspaper staff? Did you wind up recruiting some new writers? I know you were worried with last year’s seniors graduated and gone.”
She sounded off. Almost sad. He couldn’t put his finger on it exactly. She just didn’t sound like herself.
“Are you okay?” he asked impulsively, ignoring her question about the newspaper.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Of course,” she said quickly.
“You’re not,” he insisted. “Something’s wrong. Is it work? Are you frustrated about the investigation? Or is it something else?”
“Clark,” she said softly, reticent, and he wasn’t sure if it was because she didn’t want to talk about it or if it was something he had done.
“Lois, talk to me,” he said.
“I miss you,” she said, and he smiled at her non-sequitur.
“I miss you too,” he said. “I wish-”
“No, Clark. That’s…why I’m sad,” she said finally, as if he had dragged the confession from her. “I just miss you. I got spoiled. You were here. And then your letters came every day. And then you were here again. And then you only had practice so you were emailing me all day, and the letters were still coming because they were delayed, and we were talking on the phone every night after you got home from practice. And now school is back in session, and you’re so busy. And…god, if anyone knows what it’s like to be busy with work it’s me! This is ridiculous. I know that. I know this is your busy season. I knew this was coming. But, Clark…I miss you so much.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” he breathed, the endearment slipping out without warning, his heart shattering into a million pieces at the crack in her voice when she made that last confession. “I miss you too. I miss you every day. I think about you constantly. I’m sorry. I don’t want you to be sad.”
“I know,” she said quickly. “I don’t want you to feel guilty. I didn’t mean to say anything. I wouldn’t have said anything if you hadn’t pressed.”
“I’m glad you did,” he said. “I want you to talk to me. I want to know how you’re feeling. I can’t do anything if I don’t know-”
“I know you’re busy with work,” she said, interrupting him. “I know you’re making as much time as you can to talk to me. I don’t want you to do anything. That’s why I didn’t want to say anything. I just… Do you have a fall break? Can you come visit for fall break?”
“I do,” he said slowly. “And I would love to come for Fall Break. But it’s not until the end of October.”
“October?” she said, as if it was decades away.
He closed his eyes and shook his head. If only she knew. He could be there today. He could be there right now. He could stay for the weekend. She was hurting, and it was within his power to make it stop, and he couldn’t do it. Wouldn’t do it. Shouldn’t do it.
“Do you have a bye week? Could you come for a weekend?” she asked, interrupting his thoughts before they could go somewhere truly dangerous.
“Our only bye week is the weekend of the Smallville Corn Festival,” he started. “The Athletic Director schedules it that way on purpose. The team always participates in the 5K and a bunch of other events. I can’t miss it.”
She let out a little whimper of frustration, and he wanted to crawl through the phone and hug her. He took a deep breath. He couldn’t believe what he was about to say.
“I can’t leave that weekend…but you could come?” he said tentatively. “I won’t have a game, and we could spend the whole weekend together. I know it’s…not what …. I know a corn festival is not your idea of a good time. I know this isn’t what you had in mind. But it’s kind of fun. Local bands play and there’s food and dancing and fair games and fireworks. It’s-”
“When?” she asked “Just tell me when, and I’ll book a ticket.”
He exhaled loudly, his heart squeezing almost painfully in his chest.
“Lois,” he said, unsure how to finish that sentence.
“Just tell me when, Clark. I’ll be there.”
He took a deep, steadying breath, trying to calm his pounding heart. She was coming. She was coming without hesitation, without pretense.
“It’s the third weekend in September,” he said. “Friday night and Saturday. We cancel all practices and clubs on Friday after school, and most people head straight there after school or work. The 5K is first thing Saturday morning, and the bands and fireworks are Saturday night.”
“I’ll fly in Friday while you’re at work. I can rent a car. Is there a hotel in Smallville? Or…what’s the closest hotel?”
Clark hesitated. “Lois, there are no hotels in Smallville. There are some motels in Hamilton, which is sort of halfway between Wichita and Smallville. But Wichita is going to be the closest city with any decent hotel. It’s an hour away, you’re going to waste a ton of time driving. You could…stay with me. I have two fully-furnished guest rooms and a guest bathroom,” he rushed to add, not wanting her to think he was making any sort of presumption. He waited for her reaction, hoping he hadn’t pushed too far.
“Or you could stay with my parents,” he added. “They would be happy to let you stay there.”
“No,” she said quickly. “I’ll stay with you. If you’re sure.”
“Of course,” he said immediately. “I would love for you to stay with me. I don’t want you to waste half your visit driving. It’ll be wonderful having you here.”
“It’s an hour drive from the airport?” she asked. “I’ll have to get a map. Is Smallville even on the map?”
He smiled at her gentle teasing, glad to hear the sadness gone from her voice. “If you come in Thursday night, I’ll come get you. You won’t have to worry about driving or finding Smallville on a map.”
“I can do that,” she said. “I should look for a flight that lands around nine? So you can come after practice?”
“You can come earlier. I’m going to cancel Thursday’s practice since we have a bye. Give them a night to relax. I can leave work right at three, so I can be there anytime after four. Though if you come after work, it’s probably going to be eight or nine at the earliest anyway even with the time difference.”
“I’ll take a half day Thursday, and look for something that gets in around four or five.”
His heart lurched at her eagerness to come as early as possible. “That would be…I would love that. But can you get a day and half off? It’s only two weeks away.”
“I have all those vacation days just sitting there,” she said, and his mind immediately went back to that first night in the hotel bar.
“Is your editor going to have a heart attack?” he teased.
“He can chew another handful of paava leaves and get over it.”
He laughed, happier than he had been in weeks.
